Dying Changes Everything
This from a very interesting episode of House.
The character of Lou is a thirty-seven year old glorified gopher dying of a mysterious disease. The character Thirteen feels sorry for her and (as per usual in Medical drama) sees in the patient a reflection of her own diagnosis with a terminal disease.
Thirteen wonders why Lou doesn’t want more from her life. Why she doesn’t want to become something more. Leave her mark on the world. In a telling scene between the two, Thirteen is dispensing some clichéd sentiment about whatever the mind can conceive woman can achieve etc. etc.
Lou simply says:
We can aspire to anything, but we don’t get it just because we want it. I would prefer to spend my life living close to the birds rather than waste it wishing I had wings…
Such a wonderful way to say Know Thyself.
Poetry even in the oddest of places.